litany - Mahogany L. Browne

litany

Mahogany L. Browne

I wish I knew how
It would feel to be free
I wish I could break
All the chains holding me —Nina Simone

today i am a black woman in america
& i am singing a melody ridden lullaby
it sounds like:
              the gentrification of a brooklyn stoop
              the rent raised three times my wages
              the bodega and laundromat burned down on the corner
              the people on the corner
                          each lock & key their chromosomes
                          a note of ash & inquiry on their tongues

today i am a black woman in a hopeless state
i will apply for financial aid and food stamps
          with the same mouth i spit poems from
i will ask the angels of a creative god to lessen
          the blows
& i will beg for forgiveness when i curse
          the rising sun

today, i am a black woman in a body of coal
i am always burning and no one knows my name
i am a nameless fury, i am a blues scratched from
the throat of ms. nina—i am always angry
i am always a bumble hive of hello
i love like this too loudly, my neighbors
think i am an unforgiving bitter
            sometimes, i think my neighbors are right
            most times i think my neighbors are nosey

today, i am a cold country, a storm
brewing, a heat wave of a woman wearing
red pumps to the funeral of my ex-lover’s

today, i am a woman, a brown and black &
brew woman dreaming of freedom

today, i am a mother, & my country is burning
           and i forget how to flee
from such a flamboyant backdraft
                       —i’m too in awe of how beautiful i look
            on fire

Brown Girl Has Walked Into the Wild, Palms Open - Barbara Jane Reyes

Brown Girl Has Walked Into the Wild, Palms Open

Barbara Jane Reyes

  See how she lists. The body is bent as light, as wind will it.
And so you must tread light. Mind the rocks under foot. You must tread slow.
There has been drought; see where water has long ago troughed, has carved her.
  See how she branches, twisting, her many hands reaching.
Her roots also reach, sweetened from reaching. When fire arrives, she toughens.
She will slough away the thick. She will be slick, and dark beneath the rough.
She will mimic the fire her bones remember. Know her bones glisten.
  See how she rests. The body will fall, as time wills it.
See how it hollows, how her pieces return to earth.
 And from her thick trunk, mushrooms cluster—
   Her belly a nest of moss and poison.
When broken open, see what of her mother she has kept,
   what of her father, what of the stars.

United - Naomi Shihab Nye

United

Naomi Shihab Nye, 1952


When sleepless, it’s helpful to meditate on mottoes of the states.
South Carolina, “While I breathe I hope.” Perhaps this could be
the new flag on the empty flagpole.
Or “I Direct” from Maine—why?
Because Maine gets the first sunrise? How bossy, Maine!
Kansas, “To the Stars through Difficulties”—
clackety wagon wheels, long, long land
and the droning press of heat—cool stars, relief.
In Arkansas, “The People Rule”—lucky you.
Idaho, “Let It Be Perpetual”—now this is strange.
Idaho, what is your “it”?
Who chose these lines?
How many contenders?
What would my motto be tonight, in tangled sheets?
Texas—“Friendship”—now boasts the Open Carry law.
Wisconsin, where my mother’s parents are buried,
chose “Forward.”
New Mexico, “It Grows As It Goes”—now this is scary.
Two dangling its. This does not represent that glorious place.
West Virginia, “Mountaineers Are Always Free”—really?
Washington, you’re wise.
What could be better than “By and By”?
Oklahoma must be tired—“Labor Conquers all Things.”
Oklahoma, get together with Nevada, who chose only
“Industry” as motto. I think of Nevada as a playground
or mostly empty. How wrong we are about one another.
For Alaska to pick “North to the Future”
seems odd. Where else are they going?

- 2016

Frederick Douglass - Robert Hayden

Frederick Douglass

Robert Hayden, 1913 - 1980


When it is finally ours, this freedom, this liberty, this beautiful
and terrible thing, needful to man as air,
usable as earth; when it belongs at last to all,
when it is truly instinct, brain matter, diastole, systole,
reflex action; when it is finally won; when it is more
than the gaudy mumbo jumbo of politicians:
this man, this Douglass, this former slave, this Negro
beaten to his knees, exiled, visioning a world
where none is lonely, none hunted, alien,
this man, superb in love and logic, this man
shall be remembered. Oh, not with statues’ rhetoric,
not with legends and poems and wreaths of bronze alone,
but with the lives grown out of his life, the lives
fleshing his dream of the beautiful, needful thing.

Unhappy 4th of July

Having seen the horrors in store for America under this presidency, it's hard to be happy this 4th of July. I'm struggling to remember why I love America. Why it's still great, not just a promise of something great but something actually worth celebrating.

I think about tolerance. How it's still the most respected value.  (But losing ground too quickly.)

I think about being a nation of immigrants, all of us here to make the best of our lives for ourselves and our loved ones. (And immediately think of the uneven playing field. How loans are given. How we are policed. How some of us are educated better than others. How housing and job opportunities still change based on color and accents and appearance.)

I think about freedom, how we laud it. (How millions of us - mostly people of color - are jailed. How we regularly march our troops into other countries to help them stay "free.")

I think about freedom of speech, how we can still protest, write unflattering articles, and not fear jail. (But it's only some of us who have no reason to fear. Undocumented people, people of color have to think hard about whether it's worth stepping into that spotlight of suspicion.)

It's still America, and there's still so much good here. But we are under attack on so many fronts. And our rights and privileges are being swept away so quickly.

I will remember that America is worth fighting for. That Americans are worth fighting for. That justice is worth fighting for.  That the future is worth fighting for.